serfdom

[ surf-duhm ]

noun

1. the condition of being a serf in a position of servitude, required to render services to a lord:

   He lived in serfdom until 1831 when, at the age of 30, he escaped.

2. the condition or population of serfs taken as a whole:

   Her thesis analyzes the phenomenon of serfdom and the manner in which it changed between 1772 and 1848.

3. servitude of any kind:

   Technology, in the absence of scientific guidance, is a Pied Piper leading us into industrial serfdom.

Word History and Origins

Origin of serfdom¹

serf ( def ) + -dom ( def )

Example Sentences

While some Black Americans used the word “feudal,” others used related terms harkening back to the medieval world, including “vassalage,” “serfdom” and “Dark Age.”

From Salon

What will today's Ivy League alums, caught in what Yale Law professor Daniel Markovits dubs "The Meritocracy Trap," decide to do about what Harvard political theorist Danielle Allen describes as "The Road to Serfdom"?

From Salon

What will today's Ivy League alums, caught now in what Yale Law School professor Daniel Markovits dubs "The Meritocracy Trap," decide about Americans' submission to our own approximation of what Harvard political theorist and classicist Danielle Allen describes as "The Road to Serfdom" — the casino-like financing, the vicious political demagoguery and the caste-like inequities that Trump, a corrupt Supreme Court and a paralyzed Congress have all but normalized?

From Salon

The traditional Reaganite critiques of big government waste, inefficiency and onerous regulations have been increasingly supplanted by radical fulminations against the “deep state” that sound more like The Turner Diaries than The Road to Serfdom.

From Salon

Virtually all economic conservatives trace their origin story to the Austrian-born Friedrich Hayek's 1944 work, "The Road to Serfdom."

From Salon

Related Words

• bondage
• servitude